


Seaweed Brain and the Winter Soldier

by Violet_Witch



Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan, The Heroes of Olympus - Rick Riordan
Genre: Angst, F/M, Major Character Death Sort Of, Winter Soldier AU, Winter Soldier!Annabeth Chase, but not really, mind wiping
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-26
Updated: 2019-01-26
Packaged: 2019-10-17 05:52:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,399
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17554634
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Violet_Witch/pseuds/Violet_Witch
Summary: What if when Annabeth fell into Tartarus, she fell alone? What if the giants found her and decided she was more useful as an asset than she was dead? What if Annabeth was on the wrong side of the war...Loosly based on Captain America 1 & 2, but focused on Annabeth's life instead of Percy's.





	Seaweed Brain and the Winter Soldier

On the day Annabeth Chase was born, her mother consulted the Fates. 

She hadn’t even needed to speak, of course the Fates already knew. _“That one,”_ they crooned together. _“That one will be great.”_

The words echoed in Athena’s ear as she handed her daughter to the child’s new father. She did not yet know why a distinctly mortal chill skittered down her spine in response to the Fates’ promise.

When the spiders came, Annabeth learned fear for the first time.

She was faced with a choice. Stay and continue to burden a family who only saw her as a nuisance or run and take control of her future. It was never really a choice at all.

It wasn’t long before Thalia and Luke found her. The first time she saw them in action, it was like her heart beat for the first time. They shone so bright, Annabeth was afraid she’d lose herself in their light. Her saviors. The daughter of Zeus and the son of Hermes, come to lead her into the life she was always meant to have.

Then Thalia died.

And a light inside Annabeth’s very soul went out that could never be turned back on.

Her first night in the infirmary-- her first night in the place she would call home for the rest of her life-- Annabeth realized one crucial truth. Life would do everything in its power to break her, and it was her job not to bend.

When she’d woken up and dried her eyes, Annabeth did something that would alter the course of wars, save the world or doom it three times over. She picked up a dagger and she learned to fight.

Years she spent in that camp, getting stronger, tougher, smarter. She toiled day and night, Summer and Winter, leaving behind all distractions to become a warrior that the even the gods could not hurt. One way or another, she promised herself to never be weak again. No one else would die for Annabeth Chase.

Then a son of Poseidon with sea green eyes and jet black hair barrelled into her life with all the grace of a fish out of water.

He was the very definition of a distraction. Everything about him seemed designed to get a rise out of her, from his perfect teeth, to his infuriating cluelessness, to his stupid voice that was always hoarse from salt and magnetic like a siren call. Hating him was the easiest decision she’d ever made. Actually doing it turned out to be an uphill battle she could never win.

Maybe things would have turned out differently if she hadn’t gone on that first quest with him. Or the second. Or the one after that.

But every time Percy asked, she only had one answer. “I’m with you, ‘til the end of the line.”

Percy would get a soft look in his eyes, but he’d never argue with her when she said that.

Over the course of years, she learned to trust her seaweed brain with her life. More than that, she trusted him with her heart, so when she’d thought she was going to lose him, she walked away.

Then she turned back around. “You’re a punk,” she told him, dragging her seaweed brain into a kiss.

As she was walking away, she heard him mutter, “Jerk.” It took everything in her not to turn around.

_It’s unprecedented. Unplanned for. Unexpected. They’ll change everything,_ the gods whispered in horror as they watched.

Athena looked to the Fates, but they only grinned.

The older Annabeth grew, the faster time moved and the more battle sharpened her knife and her wit in equal measure. The gods did everything they could to snuff out the light that burned in Annabeth’s soul, but all they managed was feeding the fire behind her eyes.

The day she became head of the Athena Cabin, Chiron knew. He hadn’t trained a tactician of her caliber since Odysseus. She was going to be something great and there was nothing he could do to protect her from that. So he trained her harder, pushed her further. It was the best he could do for her yet it felt so… inadequate.

A couple months later, Annabeth threw herself in front of a blade for Percy. She couldn’t even say why she did it, he had the gift of Achilles, no blade should have been able to touch him, yet in that moment, she’d known with absolute certainty that the blade would kill him if she didn’t stop it. The movement had been instinctual. A response ingrained into her by a life of fighting and a connection to Percy that went beyond words.

She wondered what that said about her.

She thought she might know when Luke died. There were many words for the emotion she felt when Percy turned down immortality, but only one that _fit_.

They had faced gods and monsters alike together, shared the weight of the sky, seen and done things no sixteen year olds ever should have, was it really a surprise she’d fallen in love?

But they didn’t have time for love. Not for long lazy days, and certainly not for the life they wanted together. It didn’t even come as a surprise when the found themselves the pinnacle of a prophecy- _again._

Percy didn’t want to go. She could read it in the set of his jaw and the anger in his eyes everytime he looked at the sky. The words he bit back were clear as day to her:

_What more could you want from me? I’ve given your stupid wars everything I have yet you call me into service again!? Maybe this time I won’t go. Maybe this time I’ll just let the world burn, and you with it._

But all he said was, “Ready to follow the praetor of the twelfth legion fulminata into glorious, suicidal battle?”

“Hell, no.” Annabeth smiled wryly. “That seaweed brain from Manhattan who was too sarcastic to die? I’m following him.”

Percy kissed her and she tugged on his praetor robes gently. “But you’re keeping the outfit, right?”

“You know what? It’s kind of growing on me.”

Sure, everything sucked and the world was ending- _again_ \- but they were together. That was strength enough for the both of them.

Until they fell apart.

“Grab my hand!” Percy reached for her desperately, leaning as far as he could over the edge of the pit.

But Annabeth was already falling. He was too late. In a way, she was relieved. At least this way Percy could go on to live a happy life, even if it was without her.

Not the worst way to go.

Death was… cold.

Resurrection was worse. So, so much worse.

When her eyes opened, it felt like the first time. She couldn’t remember a before, and she knew she didn’t have an after.

The giants called her their weapon. They gave her an arm woven from magic and metal and they ordered her to plan their war.

She set to work.

Far away in a place the weapon once called home, a son of Poseidon raged. He stormed the gates of Hades, but she wasn’t there. He prayed for answers, but the gods had none.

She wasn’t dead. She couldn’t be. Because he didn’t know what he would do if she was.

One night when he was laying in the bay of the Argo II, lost in memories, Nico found him.

“Even when I had nothing, I had Annabeth.”

Nico didn’t say anything. He just sat down beside him, and somehow, Percy knew Nico understood.

Annabeth would want him to keep going. He could picture her smiling at him, telling him to go save the world.

So that’s what he would do. He would find Annabeth, and he would save the world.

Giants and monsters alike fell beneath his sword, their blood boiling in their veins and jerking their limbs like puppets on strings. Word of his new found violence spread through Tartarus like wildfire, and her handlers began to get fidgety.

She knew something was wrong. Something must have changed to set the giants so on edge, but she couldn’t fathom what. By all her calculations, they were winning the war. Would win it. If only that cursed son of Poseidon would stop foiling her perfectly laid plans.

He was a wild card, one she couldn’t afford to have walking around in a war like this. More information was required. She needed to take him out of the picture if the giants were ever to succeed.

But the son of Poseidon withstood everything she threw at him. No matter how well laid the plan, no matter the number of foes or their skill, Percy just wouldn’t die.

No matter. She would do it herself.

The weapon had done her duty as a strategist, now she could better serve as an assassin. It was merely exchanging one form of murder for another. Simple.

At least, that was the plan.

The demigod beneath her was a son of Hephaestus. He’d spent his life making weapons for Camp Half-Blood. He needed to die. It was _logical._ He was the enemy and killing him would disrupt the godly war effort by lowering moral and briefly destroying their supply chain. So far he had evaded the assassins she’d sent, but he hadn’t been able to hide from her.

Her knife clattered to the floor, and the son of Hephaestus she was sent to kill escaped.

The giants waterboarded her in the river Lethe for her failure and sent her back to reconditioning. When the weapon returned, whatever might have been left of Annabeth Chase was gone.

She tracked down the son of Hephaestus and slit his throat. The weapon would not fail again.

Demigod after demigod began to fall beneath her steel. She set traps that broke them apart. Picked off stragglers and hunted leaders. Her mission was as much to terrify as kill. And as such, it was only fitting she earned herself a reputation.

They called her a myth. A ghost. The Winter Soldier.

Her record was perfect, but still the giants refused to send her after Percy.

Until her mission was Jason Grace. He was everything a son of Zeus should be: powerful, a great leader, and oh so sickeningly _good._

She caught him when he was alone, cutting off his powers with the magic in her arm before he could raise the winds against her. He fought with a javelin and a sword, so she forced him into close quarters, rendering his weapon useless and her knife dangerous.

His movements were practiced and precise, but the Winter Soldier had every one of them memorized. By the time she had him pinned, his clothes were in rags and blood stained the ground beneath them.

She hovered above him, her braid just long enough to brush the side of Jason’s face. He really did have stunning blue eyes. They reminded her of the sky, but she’d always prefered eyes with a green tint.

Grace struggled beneath her, but the Winter Soldier just dug her knees in. The throat, or the heart? The celestial bronze of her knife glinted as she spun it in the palm of her hand.

To his credit, Grace didn’t beg. She could respect that. Others before him had.

The noise started as a dull roar, barely enough to garner her attention. That was a mistake she might not live to regret.

The water knocked the Winter Soldier clear off of Grace, sending her sprawling across the ground with a fury that reminded her of Polybotes. Of course that could only mean one thing. _Percy Jackson._

The Winter Soldier landed on all fours, her metal hand scraping against the ground as the water pushed her back. Percy came running into view, passing Grace to come straight for her. That was unexpected. From what she’d learned of Percy, he should have made sure his friend was okay before coming for her.

No matter. Grace would die either way.

The closer Percy neared, the more she drained his powers and the weaker the deluge became. Still, she was grateful to be wearing goggles.

When she could make out the color of Percy’s shirt, (Blue. Why did that seem significant?) she sprung forward, setting her eyes set on Percy’s throat with murderous intent. The son of Poseidon only recognized his powers were weakening when she knocked aside his sword with her knife and punched his stupidly perfect face.

Percy’s eyes filled with panic, but his hands were steady as he defended himself. If he weren’t an enemy and she were capable of such things, the Winter Soldier might have even admired his skill.

He managed to block each of her attacks, but he was losing ground. She could win this fight. She could destroy the giants greatest enemy. But he wasn’t her mission.

Jason was the one that needed to die. The Winter Soldier might have been a murderer, but she didn’t enjoy it. There was no practical reason to kill Percy.

Except he was a witness. The Winter Soldier didn’t leave witnesses. Particularly not powerful ones that were single handedly strangling her war effort.

Percy blocked a punch from her metal arm, but it left him vulnerable. Now was her chance to kill him. His guard was down and her knife hand was free. His eyes locked onto hers and she felt the weight of his gaze through her goggles. He realized a fraction to late too late the position he’d left himself in and his eyes widened with it.

His… green eyes. Blue-green. Like the ocean.

She spun around him and hurled her knife at the prone body still laying where she’d left it on the ground. At the last moment her wrist twitched, but it wasn’t enough. Celestial bronze thudded into flesh and the Winter Soldier’s mission was complete.

Percy let out a wordless cry of anguish, and even primordial magic wasn’t enough to stop a wave of water from rising and falling onto the Winter Soldier that broke her goggles and knocked her mask askew.

Without the time to fix it, she tossed both away and started running. Just keep going. Don’t look back. His blood was on her gloves. It had been matted in his hair. It would puddle on the ground and stain the stone long after his friends had taken the body away.

His friends… How long would it be before they arrived? Would it be McClean that cried the hardest? Or the daughter of Zeus he’d been reunited with so recently?

The sound of whistling wind was the only warning she got, and this time she didn’t ignore it.

She turned around, catching the javelin inches from her face. Grace’s javelin.

“A-Annabeth?”

Her eyes met Percy’s with nothing obscuring them for the first time. Steel gray against ocean green. They almost looked familiar.

“Who the hell is Annabeth?”

Something about the way he said the name made her want to ask questions. She wanted to stay and find out who this girl was and why she meant so much to him. But she couldn’t.

The Winter Soldier tossed aside the javelin and took off into the night.

Even when the mission had been over for days, she couldn’t think about anything else.

Grace had a cut on his lip. Pale white, and not in any of her notes. Percy had a ring of brightest blue just around his pupil. And a freckle on his collar bone.

“Mission report.”

She hadn’t seen his collar bone. How did she know that.

“Mission report, _now._ ”

It was odd how easily she could picture him above her, screaming that girl’s name again as she fell.

Enceladus hit her across the face, but Annabeth barely even felt it. “The man on the bridge… how does he know me?”

The giants shared a look. “You’re the Winter Soldier. You’ve built up a reputation.”

He was lying. Percy Jackson had always made them nervous, but now he _scared_ them. “I knew him.”

“You’ve been studying his file for weeks, it’d be disappointing if you didn’t,” Enceladus snapped.

Her eyes wandered away from him, catching on Clytius. His power was stealing magic from others. Just like her arm. He was the one that gave it to her.

The words slipped out before she could stop them. “But I knew him.”

Enceladus’ jaw clenched. “Wipe her again.”

When she finally stopped screaming, there was a fire behind her eyes. She was going to kill Percy Jackson.

It was more emotion than she’d felt in weeks.

They held her back for days, keeping her locked up and under observation. At least they fed her a steady stream of monsters to keep her busy. She wasn’t fooled. They were using her as a garbage disposal for their unfaithful.

It’s hard not to feel like a monster when you spend your days behind bars while thinking of ocean green eyes that always end in blood. So the Winter Soldier stopped trying. If they wanted a monster, she would give them a monster.

One day, the food stopped coming. So did the meager entertainment. When the door finally opened again, it was Thoon, Bane of the Fates.

He fell to his knees before her, leaking ichor all over the floor. He gave her one order. Just one.

She ran him through with her sword on the way out. He was dying anyway. She blamed the gnawing hunger in her stomach.

It seemed to be her lucky day in so many ways because the fight had come to her. She barely had to step outside before she was in the thick of it. No time to stop and find her mask and goggles- not that she would have anyway.

Demigods and gods were fighting side by side to bring down the giants. She caught sight of Piper McLean fighting side by side with her mother. She couldn’t say she was surprised. McLean was a fighter, even Grace’s death couldn’t keep her away from bloodshed like this.

She kept going. The Winter Soldier had only been given one order for that night.

She found Percy Jackson in the middle of everything, standing over Polybotes and holding Riptide. He was covered in ichor and blood. Something stirred in her chest and she took it to be anger.

Poseidon had been fighting with his son, but he’d become swept up in battle with a new opponent. Percy was, for all intents and purposes, alone. The Winter Soldier drew her sword and stalked closer.

Percy was gearing up for the downward stroke that would end Polybotes forevermore when she intervened. His sword came crashing down on hers with a resounding clang.

Her effect on him was instantaneous. His eyes widened in shock and his concentration wavered. She used the opening to push him back and away from Polybotes.

“Annabeth, please. Don’t make me do this,” Percy begged, clutching a stitch in his side with one hand and loosely gripping his sword in the other.

And there was that name again.

Somehow this ridiculous demigod had figured out how to get under her skin and it was a _name_. She wasn’t even sure why it bothered her. She just knew that hearing it made her angry.

She twirled the sword in her hand experimentally. She was vaguely aware of Polybotes limping away from them, but she paid him no head. The giants may be her masters, but Percy was her mission.

She was almost upon him and Percy still made no move to lift his sword. _“You know me.”_

The Winter Soldier cracked. “No I don’t!” she roared, bringing her sword down on him.

Percy only just barely managed to get his up in time to deflect the blow. “Annie… ” She brought it down again and again and again, but each time Percy just deflected. “You’ve known me since we were twelve.”

She hit him across the face, knocking him down, but he just got back up. “Your name is Annabeth Chase.”

“ _SHUT UP!_ ” She screamed, her voice hoarse from disuse. She swept at his side with her sword, trying to cut him in half for making her feel so… angry, but he blocked it again. Why did he keep saying that name?

Why hadn’t she killed him yet for that matter? He was injured and not even fighting back, the fight should have been easy.

Her last blow had knocked him away and Percy used the space to pull of his helmet, staggering as he did so. “I’m not going to fight you,” he said, tossing Riptide away. His breathing was so loud she could hear it from several feet away in the middle of battle. “You’re my Wise Girl.”

She couldn’t breath. It was like the air had been stolen from her lungs by those words. She wanted to run, wanted to hide, wanted to kill him for making her feel so much at once because it _hurt._

The next thing she knew she was roaring and charging him, tackling him to the ground and punching his stupid face. “You’re my _mission._ ”

Even bloodied and bruised he was beautiful.

“You’re-” She brought down her fist, “My-” again and again, “Mission-” iron meeting flesh to punctuate each word.

This was wrong. He called her Annabeth like he knew her. Like it was _her name._ Like she was a person whom he loved and not a killing machine engineered by psychopaths.

He looked at her like she was human.

Her fist wavered, hovering somewhere above them as she stared down at the boy below her.

Percy stared back, albeit through droopy eyelids. “Then finish it.” Just like that? He was willing to die? She didn’t understand- _couldn’t_ understand. “‘Cause I’m with you to the end of the line.”

Those words. They were her words. She remembered them. _She remembered._

Suddenly there was a deafening crash and by the time Annabeth opened her eyes again, she was five feet away from Percy. When she pulled herself back to her feet, her knees shook and her face was wet with blood.

Something had exploded far too close to them. It looked like she had taken the brunt of the blast, but Percy had been knocked unconscious, and the fighting was starting to close in on their little ring, getting dangerously close to his defenseless body.

Annabeth stumbled forward. She had to protect him. She still wasn’t sure why, but Percy Jackson could not be allowed to die. So she stood over his body and swept her sword in a wide circle. “Stay back,” she snarled at anyone who came close. Monster, demigod, giant, or god it didn’t matter.

No one was going to touch him. Not while she still breathed.

It was an oxymoron. She was the reason he was unconscious in the middle of a battle anyway, yet here she stood, defending him. Emotions didn’t make sense. She missed the apathy that came with being the Winter Soldier. The certainty that the mission was all.

But then, Percy Jackson _was_ her mission, so perhaps the mission still was all.

Before long a ring of yellow from monsters who had come too close created a circle around them. The giants tried to order her to stand down only once. The knife she shoved through Enceladus shut them up.

Athena approached her once as well, but Annabeth didn’t recognize her. Not yet. She merely snarled and raised her knife a little higher.

Athena backed away from her lost daughter with pain in her eyes.

The battle raged on around her, but Annabeth kept it away from Percy. Protecting him felt familiar in a way nothing had in ages. For a moment, she thought she remembered a situation just like this- but in reverse. She remembers the pain of a knife in her gut as she faded in and out. She remembered Percy holding her hand as she woke up and telling her his Achilles heel in the quiet moments between battles.

The fights seemed to blur together, opponent after opponent falling beneath her blade until all the giants had fallen and only the godly remained. They would notice her soon. Turn from their dead opponents and onto her.

Five of the most powerful demigods in the world were there and they all loved Percy. He would be safe with them.

Annabeth slipped away and watched from a distance as Percy’s friends rushed to his side.

They would care for him in ways she no longer could. Percy would be okay without her.

Annabeth’s heart hurt as she turned away and left. Why was this so hard? Leaving had always been the easiest part, yet this time she wanted to stay. But she couldn’t because Percy was too good and too kind for someone like her to stay. She knew that.

They say being a monster is hard. They’re wrong. The hard part is becoming human again afterwards.

Her mind was still in ruins, her memory in pieces. Her body was hard and trained for things she would no longer need if she decided to follow the path before her. What she needed now was to soften her edges. Vanish into the world and learn to be one of them again.

So she entered a world that was bright, vivid, and… not at war.

Every loud sound made her flich, every passerby made her suspicious. These people, they knew nothing of the war she had fought, the war that had been her life. It wasn’t fair. Because of who she was born to, her life had been doomed from the start.

And she did remember that now. Her mother was the goddess Athena and her father was Frederick Chase. Percy Jackson was her… Some things were still too painful.

Other memories were coming back as well. She spent hours curled in a ball on the floor when she remembered Jason. _Jason._

She’d killed him. Killed her friend, a good man, and her best friend's boyfriend. How could she go on when the memory of Jason’s smile and the sound of a knife thudding into flesh existed in her mind at the same time?

But she did.

And far away, Percy Jackson found himself face to face with Polybotes. The only giant that had survived the slaughter.

Poseidon was on his way to finish the giant off. All Percy needed to do was keep Polybotes there, something he was doing a fine job of considering the giant was on his knees before him, unable to stand.

“You know, she remembered you. Your wise girl, your woman, your _Annabeth,_ ” Polybotes taunted.

Percy’s concentration broke and it almost cost him his life.

A few days later he finally got a hint about Annabeth’s location.

When he found her apartment he couldn’t stop himself from looking around. There wasn’t much to see. Hardly a single identifying object in the entire place. The pantry and fridge were minimally stocked, and the bed perfectly made. In fact, it looked like she’d never even touched it. One shelf in particular drew his eye. A bookcase. Full to the brim with books of every kind. Percy stooped to inspect them, his eye catching on one book in particular that looked more like a journal. He pulled it out and opened it. Annabeth’s neat handwriting covered the page. He noticed the corner of a photograph and pulled it out. It was him. Where had she… ?

He straightened and turned around in response to the feeling of eyes on his back. Sure enough, there she stood, her mouth slightly open and he hair hidden under a baseball cap as she stared at him.

“Do you know me?” he asked, trying to keep the fear her felt out of his voice.

“You’re Percy.” She glanced away as she added, “I’ve heard a lot about you.” It took Percy a moment to notice that her eyes hadn’t just flitted away, but towards the exit.

He took a tentative step forward. If she ran, he may never find her again. “I know you’re nervous, and you have every right to be, but you’re lying.” She had to be, because he didn’t know what he’d do if she wasn’t.

Annabeth stayed completely silent.

Percy took another step forward. “You protected me. Why?” he asked, almost pleadingly.

Annabeth sighed, pulling her gloves off, to reveal a hand of metal. “I don’t know.”

Percy couldn’t take it anymore. All this distance between them when she was _right there._ He strode forward until there was only a few feet between them. “Yes, you do.”

For a second she seemed frozen in shock, her eyes not adjusting to the new height difference between them and leaving her staring at his chest. But when she did look up, her eyes were wide with wonder. Almost reverent. Like he could disappear at any moment. He knew what that felt like.

Her hand moved slowly- the one made of flesh- to hover over his face as she drank in the details of it.

“You need to shave,” she said idly, finally brushing his jaw with her fingers.

Percy smiled wryly. “Didn’t see the point.”

“You really do need me for everything.” The words were soft and so Annabeth that it took him a moment to see the hesitancy behind them. Like she was no longer sure if they were true.

Percy covered her hand with his own, turning slightly to kiss her palm. “I do.” It wasn’t the ‘I do’ he’d wished he was saying, but it was a start.

Annabeth pulled off her cap, letting her golden locks tumble down and stood up on her toes to kiss him.

He didn’t hesitate to kiss her back, wrapping his free arms around her waist to pull her closer. He’d missed this. Missed her. And even if she was only just remembering what ‘this’ had been, the way she kissed told him she’d missed it to.

When they finally parted, Percy rested his forehead against hers. “Let me take you home. Please.”

Annabeth hesitated, tensing in his arms. “Percy-” oh gods, the way she said his name- “I can’t go back. Ever.” She stepped away from him, but her expression was twisted up in knots like it was the hardest thing she’d ever had to do.

“Why not?” Percy demanded.

She looked away. “Because I killed Jason Grace. I’m not the woman you knew, and I’m not sure I can be her again.”

Percy winced, but didn’t let her words deter him. “Jason’s alive. You hit his shoulder, and he’ll probably never be able to swing a sword the same again, but he’s alive. He and Piper have been laying low in New Rome. They want to start a life there. Out of the spotlight.”

Annabeth blinked at him in surprise. The moment it took her to process his words felt like eternity, but when she did the smile that broke out on her face was worth every drop of blood he’d spilled to be reunited with her. “That’s wonderful.”

“And I know you’ve changed. I have too. That’s why I want to help you- why all of us want to help you.”

She looked at him skeptically.

“Really!” He insisted. “Before I left I visited Jason and Piper. You know what they told me? They told me to bring you home.”

Annabeth covered her mouth. Of all of them, those two were probably the ones she’d hurt the most, yet they wanted to help her? It didn’t make sense. The Winter Soldier was not deserving of sympathy. She’d killed so many, done so many things wrong. How could they forgive her? Annabeth hadn’t cried in a year, but now the tears came streaming down her face in ugle wet sobs that racked her whole body.

Percy was at her side in an instant, pulling her into his arms and holding her close. She grabbed onto his shirt and didn’t let go.

Annabeth arrived home with little fanfare. Nobody contested her presence in Camp Half Blood, but it was a private event. She didn’t mind. She wasn’t sure she could handle big crowds yet anyway.

Her friends were there though. All of the other six demigods of prophecy. Jason was the first one to hug her. He only paused to ask for permission before unflinchingly wrapping her up in his arms.

Piper followed immediately after. She was crying softly, but Annabeth couldn’t stop smiling.

Hazel, Leo, and Frank followed soon after. When they’d all hugged her and said their individual welcomes, Percy wrapped an arm around her shoulders and they talked.

Turned out Leo had had quite the exciting few months, and Annabeth was happy to hear all about his new girlfriend and Festus new body.

Frank and Hazel were bashful, but the others encouraged them until they explained that they were now living together in New Rome with Frank as praetor.

Piper and Jason told her themselves how happy they were with their new lives. When Piper showed Annabeth the ring on her finger, she nearly started weeping again. She’d missed so much, but she was here at last and at least she’d get to be at their wedding. She hugged Piper and Jason both again.

They sat for hours, filling Annabeth in on everything she’d missed and very carefully not asking her any questions. She knew she’d have to give them more of an explanation later, but for now she was grateful.

Eventually Nico arrived. He too embraced Annabeth like a sister. He even offered her one of his rare smiles as he gently lead her and Percy away from their friends to go to the infirmary.

Will was kind, and the secretive glances he kept exchanging with Nico intrigued her. She let speculation as to their relationship distract her while he looked over her health and studied her arm.

When he was done looking, he gently told her that it was medically possible to remove the arm and replace it will something else.

Annabeth hugged him. This had to be some kind of hugging record.

He smiled at her bashfully and left to go get started on some ideas with Leo and Hazel.

Chiron greeted her like a daughter, and acquiesced to talk with her about some books she’d recently read to put off the more important conversation, but when she could avoid it no longer, Annabeth squeezed Percy’s hand with her normal one and told them as much as she could. She didn’t go into detail and she left out some of the more nasty bits when it came to her torture sessions, but it was the truth.

When she was done she asked if she could leave, and not even Chiron argued when she spent the night in the Poseidon cabin.

Being back at Camp Half Blood didn’t stop the nightmares. If anything, the stress of such a big change made it worse. Annabeth was terrified that she’d wake up the next morning and go on a killing spree. There were so many people around her that she loved, but she had loved Jason, and now there was a scar on his shoulder that she had put there.

So no. Camp halfblood didn’t help her nightmares. But it did help what came after.

Back in her apartment she used to curl up in the corner and stare at the window for hours. She couldn’t really do anything else. After her nightmares, her brain always went a mile a minute, coming up with a hundred different endings to the dream. Working out scenarios and possibilities that varied ever so slightly. They rarely ended well.

But now, Percy was telling her stupid jokes that sounded like he’d memorized a kids website full of them and she was _laughing._ She’d never done that as the Winter Soldier.

They both carefully didn’t mention that the bags under Percy’s eyes that said he got them too. Not the first night any way.

No, that wouldn’t come for a few weeks.

But eventually she did, and she learned Percy was afraid of losing control.

She learned about all the things Percy had done to find her. She learned how he tore down the gates of hell and stormed Olympus. She learned about the new extent of his powers, the lines he’d crossed to get information and the nightmares he had because of it. Nightmares where all he had to do was think the wrong thing at the wrong time and his victim’s blood would boil.

It hadn’t occurred to Annabeth before then that Percy was just as broken as she was.

Holding this in mind, she took another look around.

Piper got anxiety attacks and sometimes didn’t speak for hours or days on end from fear of using her charmspeak on accident. Jason still made his bed like a soldier and always knew where the exits were. Nico didn’t sleep. Ever. He didn’t take care of himself at all unless someone forced him. Frank hadn’t taken a break from work since he’d became praetor. Hazel had a tendency to stare into space for just a little too long. Sometimes they had to physically shake her before she came back to her senses. She never told them what she saw when she looked like that. Somedays Leo holed up in his workshop for days on end, never coming out and never letting anyone else in.

But Piper and Jason loved their lives in New Rome, and they still made regular visits to both camps to offer advice and hang out with their friends. Between them, there was always someone there to push Nico into a bed and bring him a sandwich. Hazel and Frank still went on mandatory date night every Friday. Always in the normal world, always far from demigods in every possible sense. Calypso had taken to camping outside Leo’s workshop, ready to drag him to bed and feed him, then listen to him explain all the inventions he’d made when he felt better.

They were broken, but they were broken together. All of them. They weren’t dealing with this in isolation, so neither would she.

The next day Annabeth called Piper and asked if she wanted to get lunch.


End file.
